She was built as a sealer in 1874 under yard no 56 by Alexander Stephen and Sons., Linthouse, Goven, Scotland for Walter Grieve & Son. Co. at Greenock and also at St John’s New Foundland (Seal oil and pelt merchants).
June 1873 keel laid down.
19 Jan. 1874 launched under the name BEAR.
Tonnage 751 gross, dim. 190.4 x 29.9 x 18.6 ft., draught 12 ft.
Powered by a 2 cyl. compound steam engine, manufactured and fitted in by builder’s one screw. Service speed 9 knots.
Rigged as a barkentine.
Her keel, ribs and hull planking were oak. The oak planking was six inches thick and after steamed and bent to fit the ribs was fastened tightly with Swedish iron bolts. Ironwood, from Australia sheathed her oak-planking hull to protect it from the pummeling of the ice floes. This wood has the toughness of iron without iron’s lack of elasticity.
The bow of the BEAR was sheathed in one-inch thick steel plates. Every bulkhead was strengthened with beams and braces. She was in fact a sailing battering ram.
Foremast and mizzen of Norwegian pine, main mast of hollow iron.
Her decks were teak.
She carried a figurehead of a large bear, which is now in the Maritime Museum, Newport News, Va. Having been presented to them by Admiral Byrd.
26 Feb. 1874 delivered, under command of Capt. Alexander Graham, born in New Foundland but at that time living in Greenock, she sailed to New Foundland, where she arrived on 10 March 1874 in St John’s.
He signed on there 250 men and sailed out again on 12 March for the sealing grounds around New Foundland.
During her time as a sealer she had three other captains: Drummond, Ash(e) and Dawe.
Her catches per year between 1874 and 1883 were:
1874 12.653 seals, 1875 13.804 seals, 1876 10.243 seals 1877 8.986 seals, 1878 13.756 seals, 1879 7.552 seals, 1880 5.771 seal, 1881 990 seals, 1882 841 seals, 1883 30.298 seal with a value of £200.000.
11 December 1883 arrived Greenock under command of Capt Ash(e). Drydocked and surveyed and a new larger boiler fitted.
05 Jan. 1884 sailed Greenock under command of Capt Ash(e), arrived 19 January at St John’s and was sold to the U.S. Government for $ 100.000, the same day.
15 Feb. the BEAR arrived under command of Capt Ash(e) by the Brooklyn Navy yard at New York.
17 March 1884, commissioned under command of Capt. W.H.Emory.
The BEAR was purchased for the rescue of Lieutenant A.W.Greeley, USA and his expedition who were marooned in the Arctic.
She was hurriedly sailed to New York where she was outfitted for her Arctic rescue mission. She and the USS THETIS become the last hope for the ill-fated Greely Expedition, which was trapped at Lady Franklin Bay in Northern Greenland. The expedition under the command of Lieutenant A.W.Greely, had set up a camp to study the winter conditions of the north in 1881. When relief ships failed to break through the ice to reach them in 1882 and 1183, the survivors gambled that a rescue ship would be coming, broke camp, and started trekking south. From August to October 1883 they moved south, then set up camp for the winter. By springtime the food had run out; they were desperate.
On 4 May 1884 the BEAR and THETIS headed north from Canada, pushing onward’s under steam and sail, soon having to battle through pack ice while keeping a lookout for the expedition. On 22 June 1884 the BEAR and THETIS finally arrived at the expedition’s camp at Cape Sabina. Only Lieutenant Greely and six men remained alive. BEAR immediately turned south and raced the men to Portsmouth, NH for medical treatment.
April 1885 the BEAR was decommissioned and transferred to the Revenue Cutter Service for use on the Bering Sea Patrol.
From 1886 until 1926, the USRCS BEAR was stationed at San Francisco. The United States had only recently purchased Alaska, and while most of the government settled into a pattern of ignoring the territory, the Revenue Service took it upon itself to establish a presence there in the interest of fundamental law and order. At that time there were only lighthouses and no buoys or beacons for thirty-five thousand miles of jagged, treacherous coast-line.
Several cutters were based in San Francisco and Oakland, but every spring they would make their way up the coast to Washington State before striking out across the open sea for the Aleutians. BEAR was the largest of the cutters. It had a crew of nine officers and forty men-most of whom like their captain, spent their entire careers in the far north. It could do eight knots under sail and more than nine when its steam engines were put to use. Because of her superior size and strength, the BEAR was assigned the northern most duty – the Bering Sea, the Chukchi Sea and the Arctic Ocean – through uncharted ice-choked seas.
On 21 April 1886, sailing orders were received and on 2 May 1886 the Revenue Cutter BEAR steamed out under the Golden Gate bridge, her course set for Unalaska. It was the beginning of a relationship that would last from 1886 until 1926 and make the BEAR and her captain, Capt Healy (from 1886-1895) the pride of the Revenue Cutter service and heroes to the whaling fleet. The BEAR, in short became a floating government. The Secretary of the Treasury advised Captain Healy to take the census, count ships, seize all vessels in the Seal Islands (St George and St Paul) and arrest the crews, arrest any person found smuggling liquor or firearms to the Indians and Eskimos, take soundings, bearing, geodetically and astronomical observations, record the tides and currents north of the Aleutians and escort the whale ships onto Point Barrow. Its Captains especially Mike Healy, became legendary, acting as judge, doctor, and policeman to Alaska Natives and other people of Alaska.
From headquarters on Unalaska Island, the ships would spend the summer cruising the Bering Sea and Straits, putting in at various places along the Alaskan coast. And at the Pribilof and other small Islands. These were the prime seal rookeries, and the Revenue Service waged a constant and often unsuccessful battle against illegal seal hunting. The ship would then work their way around the top of Alaska, heading as Far East as Point Barrow. These waters had become the principal hunting grounds for the American whaling fleet, which was enjoying its last few years of prosperity. The work was dangerous and unpredictable, with the ice pack never more than ten miles offshore. As the summer advanced and the ice began to move in, cutters and whalers alike would break south, but not always fast enough. Officers like Mike Healy helped pull many ships out of the ice, rescued the stranded survivors, and more than once brought back the frozen bodies of the less fortunate.
For more than 36 years the BEAR traveled north into the Arctic each spring and with the coming of winter returned to San Francisco to lay up for the WINTER. In the Arctic, the BEAR acted as a mail boat, supply ship, hospital, police department and court for the isolated northern settlements, in the process becoming an institution of the northern settlements, and particularly under the command of Captain Michael “Hell Roaring Mike” Healy, contributed greatly to the United States relations with the indigenous peoples (To relieve starving natives, Healy sailed to Siberia purchased reindeer at his own expense, and transplanted the herd by ship to Alaska to become the nucleus of a herd for food and hides..) The BEAR also made important contributions “at home:” her crew played a major role in rescue operations following the San Francisco earthquake of 1906.
During the decade in which Michael Healy was its captain, the BEAR was not merely a useful ship; Bear was, as the official historian of the Coast Guard has said, “a symbol for all the service represents—for steadfastness, for courage, and for constant readiness to help men and vessels in distress.”
In 1915 the revenue Cutter service became part of the Coast Guard, and BEAR became USCGC BEAR. During World War I she worked for the navy, but went back to Bering Sea patrol after the war. BEAR was deemed obsolete in 1921, but no replacement was available, so she served on. In 1924 she was trapped in ice, pushed ashore in a storm and reported to be destroyed, but she was eventually hauled off with little damage. In 1926 marked BEAR’s 36th and final voyage into the Bering Sea.
She was sold by the Coast Guard in 1929 to the City of Oakland, Calif., for use as a museum.
During that time she was playing a part in the filming of the “The Sea Wolf” and she was Death Larsen’s sealship MACEDONIA in that film.
Shortly when BEAR was retired, Admiral Byrd decided to purchase the ship to replace his old CITY OF NEW YORK for his next expedition to the South Pole. The Admiral requested that the City of Oakland put BEAR up for action so he could buy her. This was done, but Byrd almost lost the ship when a scrap dealer unexpectedly bid $1.000 for her. Byrd informed the scrapper of his intentions, bid $ 1.050 and acquired the ship. Bear was renamed BEAR OF OAKLAND sailed to Boston to refit.
The old barkentine sailed from Boston on 25 September 1933 in company of the steamer JACOB RUPPERT, bound for New Zealand. On the way she weathered many severe storms, one of which forced her into Newport and into the drydock of Newport News Shipbuilding & Drydock for repairs. She finally arrived at Wellington, NZ, on 6 January 1934.
The BEAR OF OAKLAND sailed for Little America, the Antarctic base, on 19 Jan. 1934 and arrived there on 31 Jan. She unloaded her supplies and equipment.
After making several exploration trips through the ice, she met a British ship offshore and picked up the expedition’s doctor. She then had to fight her way back through ice to drop the doctor and pick up extra personnel; she barely made the trip. After 8 desperate hours conducting final loading and unloading operations, BEAR OF OAKLAND sailed north out of the ice. She encountered terrific gales on the trip north, struggling through winds up to 100 miles an hour, and being blown onto her beam ends.
The BEAR OF OAKLAND sailed north to New Zealand, spent the Antarctic winter in overhaul, and again sailed south on 1 January 1935. She was so deeply laden with supplies and equipment that she had but 20 inches of freeboard. BEAR OF OAKLAND arrived at Little America on 19 January and began the evacuation of the base. The work went on around the clock for two weeks, with the BEAR OF OAKLAND shuttling between the icepack and the steamer RUPPERT standing by offshore. The evacuation was completed and the BEAR OF OAKLAND sailed north again on 5 February. Her voyage finally ended at Boston, where she lay alongside a wharf, unmaintained for many years. Most people thought she would never sail again.
In 1939 President Roosevelt commissioned Admiral Byrd to lead an expedition to Antarctica to lay claim to previously unclaimed territory there. BEAR OF OAKLAND was repurchased by the Navy on 11 September 1939, she was commissioned the same day as BEAR (AG-29) overhauled to serve as flagship of the expedition; she was joined by NORTHLAND. BEAR received new diesel engines and new spars before she sailed south on 22 November 1939. She arrived off Antarctica on the 31 December. During the next few weeks she set new records by pushing through the ice to points never before reached. At one point she was trapped and nearly crushed, only escaping because her spotting aircraft found a lead through the ice. Again the BEAR spent the winter in New Zealand, returning to pick up the expedition in late December 1940 and returning home 18 May 1941.
When she arrived at Boston the Battle of the Atlantic was raging at that time. Due to a shortage of patrol ships she rejoined the Navy as a Greenland patrol ship. Her rig was cut down to two pole masts; she became a motor vessel. On the Greenland patrol she made the first US capture of the war; the German ship BUSKO, captured while setting up a radio station to assist U-boats.
BEAR served until new vessels were available to replace her; arrived Boston 15 November 1943 and was laid up at Boston.
17 May 1944 decommissioned and transferred to the Maritime Commission on 13 Feb. 1948.
She was offered for sale and purchased by Frank M.Shaw of Montreal for $ 5199.00, he renamed her ARCTIC BEAR.
1948 Towed to Canada for reconversion to her original sealing role, but this plan fell through. ARCTIC BEAR was abandoned in the mud at Halifax.
In 1962 she was purchased and converted to a restaurant/museum ship for use at Philadelphia; her original name BEAR was restored. In March 1963 the tug IRVING BIRCH towed her from Halifax, bound for Philadelphia. A few days out a gale struck, parting the towline. BEAR’s foremast collapsed, poking a hole in her hull, and she slowly filled and sank.
She went down early in the morning of 19 March 1963, 250 miles east of Boston.
Rumania 1985 5le sg5012, scott3351.
Source: downloaded from Hazegray web-site. Dictionary of American Fighting Ships. Information supplied by Mr. John D. Stevenson on her early career as a sealer.